The Bigger Picture: Visual Archives and the Smithsonian

Inside a Wikipedia Edit-a-Thon

We just co-hosted our second Wikipedia edit-a-thon focusing on articles related to the history of the Smithsonian (our first edit-a-thon in honor of Women’s History Month focused on women employees at the Smithsonian who were in the sciences) with our Wikipedian-in-Residence, Sarah Stierch, who has been with us since March. I’ve enjoyed seeing in-person how Wikipedians work. They are tireless list-makers, they cite[i] everything (even in email!), and they do everything, from correcting simple typos to transcribing lengthy articles.

I was impressed with what a group of sixteen individuals (three of whom joined us online) were able to accomplish in a mere four hours which even included a tour of the Archives. Some of the highlights are:

If you would like to become an online volunteer with the Archives to help make our collections and resources more accessible, there are still several articles to be written and updated. You can see the full to-do list here which has citations to relevant online resources. Consider working on one of the people listed below who either worked for or were affiliated with the Smithsonian. As a group, they illustrate how diverse the people and activities of the Smithsonian have been over the years.

Wilbur Olin Atwater — Honorary Curator of food at the United States National Museum (now the Smithsonian National Museum of Natural History), 1884 to 1892.

Charles Knight had the amazing ability to generate scientifically accurate art representations of prehistoric animals, essentially bringing them to life. In addition to the Smithsonian, you can find the work of Charles Knight at the National Zoo, Bronx Zoo, Lincoln Park Zoo, Pittsburgh’s Carnegie Museum and Yale’s Peabody Museum of Natural History. Roger Tory Peterson had the similar ability and style in documenting animals in two dimensions that were not only art, but natural history contributions as well.